


Movie Night

by EtchJetty



Series: Etch's Sketches - A One-Shot Collection [14]
Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: F/F, Movie Night
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2020-03-29 23:11:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19029868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EtchJetty/pseuds/EtchJetty
Summary: Emma and Sophia try to figure out what to watch, and in the process, Emma uncovers ugly memories.





	Movie Night

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Cauldron Cup 3! I got out in the first round, but every snip was very good!

"Anything good on?” asked Sophia, legs hanging over the edge of the couch. She leaned backwards to face Emma, the top of her head digging slightly into the couch cushion with the action. Her smartphone rested on her chest.

Emma flipped through the on-screen guide, the hard plastic buttons on the remote clacking as she did so. Sophia watched impassively, the little lines on Emma’s face crinkling as she squinted to make out the titles listed on the screen. Finally, Emma turned to Sophia. “Doesn’t look like it, no,” she said.

“What about pay-per-view?” asked Sophia. “On demand, that kinda thing?”

Emma sighed, and navigated to the On-Demand menu. “I don’t get why we have to use On-Demand,” she said, even as she began scrolling through the menu labelled _Recent Hits_.

“Well, you basically have nothing good on Blu-ray, so that’s what we’re stuck with,” said Sophia. She adjusted her position on the couch, propping her head up on Emma’s leg, and unlocked her phone, scrolling through her feed.

Emma squawked indignantly. “I have good things on Blu-Ray!” she said.

Sophia snorted and put her phone down again to look up at the redhead. “No, you don’t. You have Veggietales on Blu-Ray.”

“I have Veggietales on DVD, FYI, Soph,” corrected Emma, the corners of her mouth turning upwards. “Check yourself before you jump to conclusions.”

“You still have Veggietales, though, so my point about your movie collection being sad still works.” Sophia went back to her phone.

Emma grumbled silently and went back to flicking through movies. After a while, she said, “Oh, here, I have one. Have you seen the new Legend documentary?”

Sophia looked up at Emma. “You mean the one they sued Will Smith for? Because they wanted to call it _I Am Legend_ when they were making it but then he announced his movie, so they sued him?”

“Wait, what?” asked Emma. “I didn’t hear about this.”

Sophia shrugged, her shoulders rubbing against Emma’s leg. “I spent a fair amount of extremely boring hours in the PRT PR department. You get to hear them whine about losing the suit.”

Emma didn’t have a response to this. Instead she scrolled down slightly further into the _Oldie Classics_ section. “Oh, here, Duck Soup by the Marx Brothers!” she exclaimed.

“Duck what?” asked Sophia.

“Duck Soup, it’s a black-and-white film. Really funny. You know that joke every sitcom ever has made, the one with, like, the mirror? Where two characters are facing each other, and one accidentally broke the mirror in between them, so in order to save face, that person imitates all the actions of the other person?”

“...sounds vaguely familiar,” Sophia admitted.

“Well, they did it here first!” exclaimed Emma. “And the main character’s really funny, too, oh, I used to watch this movie all the time with—” and suddenly Emma stopped cold.

Sophia noticed. “Emma, what—oh.”

“Yeah,” said Emma.

“You watched this movie with _her._ ” Sophia sat up straight on the couch, facing Emma, who looked away.

“You know, it can still be a good movie,” said Sophia. “Just because a worthless waste of space likes it doesn’t mean it’s objectively bad.”

Emma was silent. Then—

“It’s not about the movie itself,” said Emma. “It’s about the whole experience of rewatching it.”

Sophia made a small motion with her hand, encouraging Emma to keep talking.

“Well—how do I put this. When you rewatch _The Lion King_ , what do you think of?”

Sophia thought for a moment, then responded, “I think of that time my family went to see Lion King on Broadway,” she said, a wistful smile on her face. “It was one of the first showings they did after the theatre officially reopened, after Behemoth. I don’t think I’ll ever be that... unaware ever again.”

“Blissful?” offered Emma.

“I wouldn’t call it that,” said Sophia. “I mean, I fucking love being Shadow Stalker. But there’s, like, weight on my shoulders. Responsibility. I _have_ to kick ass and take names, or else nobody will do it for me. And while that’s fun...”

“You miss not having responsibility?” offered Emma.

Sophia shrugged. “That works, I guess,” she finished.

Emma put the remote down and turned to face Sophia, her back against the couch’s armrest. “Watching a movie takes you back, right?” she said. “And, where for you it might take you back to seeing Lion King, I just...”

“Can’t untangle the memory with Taylor.”

Emma nodded. “Yes! You get it. I don’t know why, but, like, certain things, just kind of trigger...” Emma trailed off. Sophia watched her intently.

“Trigger what?”

“Emotions. Like when you mentioned Veggietales earlier. The first thing I thought of was that time you and Mads came over and we went through all the old DVDs and stuff under my bed. And that was a great time, y’know?”

Sophia smiled, then said, “So you never watched Veggietales with Taylor?”

“I did. And it was horrible,” said Emma.

“Then why didn’t you think of her when I mentioned it earlier?”

Emma opened her mouth, then paused. Then she rested her chin on her hand.

“I actually don’t know,” she said, after a few moments. “I think maybe at the time, when we were going through my old stuff, I thought of her, but now I think of us going through the boxes, y’know. Not the act of watching.”

Sophia picked up the remote from where Emma had left it. “Science has proven that you’re capable of making new memories, it seems,” she said, grinning. “So let’s watch the hell out of this movie, you and me, and now you’ll have a viewing with me to remember instead of a viewing with the walking equivalent of toxic waste.”

Emma thought for a moment. Then—

“Yeah, sure, fuck it. You wanna make the popcorn, or should I?”

“You make the popcorn, it’s your house,” said Sophia. And as Emma left the couch, Sophia smiled.

Damn, was Emma a fun person to be around.


End file.
